College tends to make people happier, healthier, and wealthier. But how?
Season 3, Episode 4
Is a college diploma really worth the paper it’s printed on? In this episode of Freakonomics Radio, host Stephen Dubner breaks down the costs and benefits of going to college, especially during an economy that’s leaving a lot of people un- and underemployed. The data say that college graduates make a lot more money in the long run and enjoy a host of other benefits as well. But does that justify the time and money? We’ll hear from economists David Card, Betsey Stevenson, and Justin Wolfers, as well as former Bush adviser Karl Rove, who made it to the White House without a college degree. Amherst College president Biddy Martin describes what an education provides beyond facts and figures, while Steve Levitt wonders if the students he teaches at the University of Chicago are actually learning anything. Finally, a former FBI agent tells us about the very robust market for fake diplomas.
The consequences of our low marriage rate — and if the old model is less attractive, how about a new one?
Thick markets, thin markets, and the triumph of attributes over compatibility.
Season 5, Episode 4
In part one (“Diamonds Are a Marriage Counselor’s Best Friend“), we meet Jason and Kristen Sarata, a couple who win a diamond at a charity event. But the two can’t agree on whether to sell the diamond or keep it. Luckily, investigative reporter Edward Jay Epstein has written an entire book about selling a diamond, and tells us it’s unclear whether diamonds are as valuable as Marilyn Monroe taught us to think they are.
On this week’s Freakonomics Radio, we meet a young Michigan couple who win a diamond at a charity event and then can’t decide what to do with it. Sell? Set it in a ring? Or stash it in the laundry room and just keep fighting about it? We also hear from Edward Jay Epstein, who wrote a book about trying to resell a diamond, and we learn the strange, shady history of how diamonds have come to be as “valuable” as they are.
The U.S. president is often called the “leader of the free world.” But if you ask an economist or a Constitutional scholar how much the occupant of the Oval Office matters, they won’t say much. We look at what the data have to say about measuring leadership, and its impact on the economy and the country.
Season 6, Episode 23 On this week’s episode of Freakonomics Radio: an economist’s guide to dating online. PJ Vogt bravely lets us evaluate his OkCupid account, and we teach him how to game the algorithms. Plus: Stephen J. Dubner on the state of the marriage union. To find out more, check out the podcasts from which this hour was drawn: “Aziz Ansari Needs Another Toothbrush,””Why Marry? . . .
In one of the earliest Freakonomics Radio episodes (No. 39!), we asked a bunch of economists with young kids how they approached child-rearing. Now the kids are old enough to talk — and they have a lot to say. We hear about nature vs. nurture, capitalism vs. Marxism, and why you sometimes don’t tell your friends that your father is an economist.
In one of the earliest Freakonomics Radio episodes (No. 39!), we asked a bunch of economists with young kids how they approached child-rearing. Now the kids are old enough to talk — and they have a lot to say. We hear about nature vs. nurture, capitalism vs. Marxism, and why you sometimes don’t tell your friends that your father is an economist. . . .
In one of the earliest Freakonomics Radio episodes, we asked a bunch of economists with young kids how they approached child-rearing. Now the kids are old enough to talk — and they have a lot to say. We hear about nature vs. nurture, capitalism vs. Marxism, and why you don’t tell your friends that your father is an economist.
In one of the earliest Freakonomics Radio episodes, we asked a bunch of economists with young kids how they approached child-rearing. Now the kids are old enough to talk — and they have a lot to say. We hear about nature vs. nurture, capitalism vs. Marxism, and why you don’t tell your friends that your father is an economist.
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